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Tuesday, 26 July 2016

Modified Dragoons, (Warlord) - Part 2 of 6

During the long preparation (it turned out to be a rather long thinking process) of these models I considered various options of how to make these figures represent dragoons. Fortunately I eventually recalled the autobiography of Phillipp von Boeselager, a German officer who served on the Russian front during WWII and was involved in the closest attempt to assassinate Hitler, the book is titled Valkyrie: The Plot To Kill Hitler (you'll have to bear with me on this one). He was one of the very few who survived the executions that followed the failed coup d'etat. Although the modern perception of the German army during WWII is often that of large armoured columns attacking across all fronts, vast numbers of horses were still used for transport and haulage.

In his book von Boeselager describes combat experiences which, for to me at least, closely resembled those of dragoons during the ECW. During reconnaissance or defence actions soldiers, under von Boeselager command, would dismount leaving one man holding the reins of anywhere between four and ten horses. This single man would then ride away a short distance to a safer area. This soldier could quickly return to the others troops if and when needed. With this in mind I thought I would try to replicate this using these models

This group depicts one rider holding the reins of three other horses. There are four horses in total simply because that's how many would neatly fit onto the base (from Warbases). The single rider is a bog standard figure straight out the box. I cut away the moulded plastic reins and remade the connecting new ones using lengths of greenstuff. Again using greenstuff I built up the saddles on the riderless horses. This are perhaps the easiest modification of the entire set. Don't worry, the other modification caused me a lot more grief - all for your viewing entertainment.